Personal Development for the 21st Century

A life-long process for achieving a balanced and fulfilled life, accepting nothing less than the best. If taught at school,children would graduate with self-belief and reachable goals rather than a lack of life skills.

People often tell me they are TOO OLD to start in business or even succeed in any venture. You are only too old if you believe that. If you believe that age is just a number and not defining reason then anything is possible.

Ray Croc, the founder of McDonalds, sold paper cups and milkshake mixers until 52.
Ariana Huffington started Huffington Post at 54.
John Pemberton invented Coca Cola at 55.

Of course, no one is saying that these people started these companies and were successful with their first attempts. Some household names went through several businesses until they found the idea that took off. Some ideas are worth waiting for in the life of an entrepreneur.

Thursday, 29 May 2014

I can recommend the charming novel "The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry" by Rachel Joyce which was her first novel and The Sunday Times bestseller.

It is the story of Harold who receives a letter informing him that a former colleague, Queenie, is dying of cancer in a hospice. His attempts to write a goodbye letter fail miserably and on the way to the postbox, he decides, through a chance conversation, that a letter is inadequate and that he should walk more than 400 miles "to save Queenie's life". As if he could, but the story develops and he becomes a national hero, others joining in his walk for their own personal pilgrimage reasons. With time to think, he reassesses his life as does his wife waiting for him back home.

Not quite the pilgrimage road to Santiago de Compostela, Harold's journey can teach us something about our own journey in life, what is important, who is important. My library classified it as a Reading Well: Mind-Boosting Book and I certainly endorse that.

Tuesday, 21 January 2014

"To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you." - Lewis B. Smedes

Most of us carry around anger, resentment, jealousy, or some other negative emotion directed to others. Unless dealt with, they will eventually start to broadly affect the quality of our lives and those around us.

Forgiveness is the act of unchaining yourself from thoughts and feelings that bind you to an offense, imagined or real, committed against you. It is a commitment to a process of growth and change. The first step is to recognize the value of forgiveness and the positive impact it can have in our lives. When we forgive, we release the control and power of the offending person and stop playing the victim. We no longer define our lives by how we have been hurt and instead can define ourselves by how we have grown.

Wednesday, 15 January 2014

"I've missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times, I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed." - Michael Jordan

Tuesday, 7 January 2014

The 92-year-old, petite, well-poised and proud lady, who is fully dressed each morning by eight o'clock, with her hair fashionably coiffed and makeup perfectly applied, even though she is legally blind, moved to a nursing home today. Her husband of 70 years recently passed away, making the move necessary. After many hours of waiting patiently in the lobby of the nursing home, she smiled sweetly when told her room was ready. As she manouvered her walker to the elevator, I provided a visual description of her tiny room, including the eyelet sheets that had been hung on her window. "I love it," she stated with the enthusiasm of an eight-year-old having just been presented with a new puppy. "Mrs. Jones, you haven't seen the room .... just wait." "That doesn't have anything to do with it," she replied. "Happiness is something you decide on ahead of time. Whether I like my room or not doesn't depend on how the furniture is arranged ... it's how I arrange my mind. I already decided to love it ... It's a decision I make every morning when I wake up. I have a choice; I can spend the day in bed recounting the difficulty I have with the parts of my body that no longer work, or get out of bed and be thankful for the ones that do. Each day is a gift, and as long as my eyes open I'll focus on the new day and all the happy memories I've stored away ... just for this time in my life."Source: Facebook

When planning each day, he considered "Prosecute the present study" which means to invest time for education, study or some form of self-improvement. If such a great man as Benjamin Franklin included this on his daily schedule, do you think it would benefit each of us?

Antonia Harrison is The Lifestyle Liberator offering freedom from bad habits, addictions and limiting fears through Hypnosis, NLP, Coaching and Personal Development. Based in Portsmouth (UK) she helps people worldwide on Skype at http://www.EnglishSkypeHypnotist.com

Wednesday, 26 June 2013

This morning I started a course of sessions with a Personal Trainer. I have been going to the gym regularly, doing my cardio workout and machine-based exercises plus I take weekly swimming classes so I think I am pretty fit. I just want that extra "oomph" to lose a few kgs and tighten up some of the legs-bums-tums muscles that us women have a problem with, especially when we have had children so our abdomen muscles have stretched to a ridiculous size in relation to the rest of our body.The good news is that my Personal Trainer, Dan, is very good looking and knows what he is doing. The bad news is that I ache and feel weary all over.

The easy option would be to give up now, go back to my previous exercise plan, but what would that achieve?As Jim Rohn said,

"Take
care of your body. It's the only place you have to live."

Exercise is a discipline of both body and mind. I know that choosing not to do the exercise will mean that I cannot wear some of my favourite clothes this summer because right now they are too tight. Longer-term, I do not want to be one of the middle-aged women who have allowed the lbs/kgs to stick to my waist and thighs. There are many women younger than me in my health club who are very obese. At some point, they made the wrong choices and now they are trying to shed that weight. It is so much easier to have the discipline now rather than having to correct the lack of discipline later.

"We
must all suffer one of two things: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret
or disappointment."

Are there areas in your life where you know that discipline is what is needed to help you achieve your goals? I can help you with my unique combination of Hypnosis, NLP Results Coaching and Personal Development to instill the motivation and determination to start the process and maintain the discipline to keep going. I help people worldwide through Skype so contact me today, the English Skype Hypnotist, to set out a plan for reaching your goals with discipline of steel.

Monday, 10 June 2013

"I wish for you a life of wealth, health and happiness; a life in which you give to yourself the gift of patience, the virtue of reason, the value of knowledge, and the influence of faith in your own ability to dream about and achieve worthy rewards." - Jim Rohn